tal by the application of their gigantic force, to the transport of those vast masses of sculptured and chiselled rock, which we marvel to see lying in positions so far removed from their natural site.
The existence of these ancient paved causeways also, not only from their solid construction over the flat and low plains of the valley, but as they may be traced running for miles over the dry table land and the mountains, appears to me to lend plausibility to the supposition; as one might inquire—to what end the labour of such works, in a country where beasts of burden were unknown?
But I leave this subject to wiser heads and bolder theorists. Had the mammoth of Chapingo been discovered with a ring in his nose, or a bit in his mouth; a yoke on his head, or a crupper under his tail, the question would have been set at rest. As it is, there is plenty of room for conjecture and dispute.[1]
On leaving Tezcuco, in the course of the morning, we took the road conducting to the northeast.
An advance of five leagues over dusty roads, and through picturesque villages, whose cottages were almost hidden from view by the close hedge of the organ cactus, brought us to a slope of a hill commanding a view of the valley of. San Juan Teotihuacan.
The two huge pyramidal masses rising in the centre of the plain, anciently called Micoatl, or the Path of the Dead, immediately arrest the attention. They lie two miles east of the town, which, imbosomed in shady groves, and irrigated throughout by plenteous streams of clear water, seemed to us a very paradise, after our shelterless ride in the hot sun.
My companions betaking themselves to a state of tor-
- ↑ The remains of five distinct species of mastodon have been determined; and of these, four have been found on the continent of America, spread over a surface, extending from the districts south of the St. Lawrence, to Lake Titicaca.
